


There's one small thing that this useless me can do

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: F/M, Gen, Instant dokis, Lowbloods as pets, Scary seadwellers, Slaves as pets, Stockholm
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-29
Updated: 2013-03-29
Packaged: 2017-12-06 22:05:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/740661
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Reelas adjusts to his new home</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's one small thing that this useless me can do

The first thing you remember is waking up. You remember it because it's a hard to describe feeling, the feeling of being really, truly awake for the first time in a couple of perigees. You remember those weeks in vague flashes; your system hadn't taken the drugs well, and as such you'd spent the whole time drifting in and out of varying states of consciousness, slurred words and nasty glares. You don't get to remember too much else, because you're too distracted by all your senses slowly crawling back in, giving you a feel for what's happening. 

You immediately notice a sharp throbbing right at the base of your skull, likely a side effect of half your weight in sedatives slowly wearing its way out of your system. You also notice a dull throbbing in your throat, which intensifies into a rough stinging when you attempt a groan. It comes out a muted, muffled sort of sound, and you promptly grimace, taking a moment to wonder what's wrong with your voice before being cut off by the sound of talking.

"I think he's coming to,"

"What? Lemme sea,"

You feel your ears twitch as the sound grates against them, your poor aural sponges yet unprepared for sound just yet. You hear shuffling around, followed by the faint pressure of something touching your legs and the smell of someone's perfume just a little too close to your face. Your eyes flick open and you immediately regret it. You hiss as the light stabs you right in the skull and snap your eyelids shut again. It takes a good minute for you to attempt a reopening.

Your vision clears to reveal an environment you don't recognise, along with two girls who look vaguely familiar, but your head is a little too fuzzy to recall offhand. One is sitting nearby with her legs tucked under her, giving you this curious stare. The other is leaning half over you, a bit too close for your personal comfort level. You don't know what you were expecting, but you do know that this is a bit of a surprise. You open your mouth to make some kind of protest, ask what the hell is going on, ask where your owner is, but all that comes out is a series of raspy squeaks and whines as your vocal chords strain to make sound through the heavy damage they've taken. You stop to cough, a hand flying up to the front of your throat. You feel like you've swallowed glass.

"Hey, don't blue that. You're going to hurt yourself,"

You flick your eyes towards the one that spoke. It's the one off to the side, the greenblood with the long hair and glasses. You spend several moments scrutinising her before you're distracted again, determined not to let your guard down around whoever is speaking. Once again, you find yourself facing the girl blatantly invading your personal space. You immediately notice the fins. You then notice the rest of her features, mostly because you're staring her right in the face. She looks about your age. A bit bigger, but so is everyone. The colours on her face confuse you for a moment, before you realise what they are. You've never seen anyone wear makeup aside from the handful of girls your owner had over from time to time; certainly no one your age.

You decide that she's pretty.

She grins at you, exposing a set of sharp-pointed teeth that put your own to shame.

You change your mind. She's terrifying.

"Shello, guppy. Nice to sea you awake," she says, still leering at you like she wants to eat you or cull you or both. You back up as far as you can, until your back is pressed flat against whatever it is you're propped against. Your eyes are wide as saucers and you probably look about as scared shitless as you feel, because she doesn't actually come any closer. You are breathing a mile a minute and desperately attempting to summon up even a spark of electric energy to your skin. Something to protect you, make you feel safer. You got nothing. There isn't anything electronic close enough for you to sap, and you've been dry for the entire time you were out. You are powerless, your claws are blunt, and you are fairly sure that if you bite, you're going to lose a fang or two. You are defenseless and god, do you feel it. The scary-pretty seadweller girl gives you this perplexed and slightly disappointed pout, then turns to the jadeblood.

"Hey Jas, is he s'posed to be doing that?"

She shrugs.

"You shore he ain't broke?"

She nods, and then they're both staring at you. You freeze. Your mind races. What do you do, what do you do? You open your mouth, and an unintelligible mess of chirps and squeaks comes out. She looks at you like you're stupid, and you feel profusely ashamed for some reason. You can't put your finger on it, but for some reason the thought that you're disappointing her puts a nasty feeling in your stomach, and you can't say you like it. You try a different approach. You close your eyes for a moment, focusing all your energy and thought and will, and when you reopen them, they have a faint silver glow. You psychically push the seadweller off of your legs and then pull said legs up to your chest, tucking your chin behind your knees and staring at the two of them from there. You feel a bit more secure, at least. The seadweller looks a bit confounded. She reaches out, a bit curiously, and that's where you draw your line. You uncurl and dart away in one fluid, quick movement, zooming down the nearest hallway in an attempt to find some sort of hiding spot. You're too quick to follow, though to be honest, you're pretty sure they're too surprised to try. You do eventually find a nice place to nestle yourself in, good and hidden, and you do so.

"Greyt," you hear, from the living space.  
~~~  
Weeks pass with very little change. The routine is very uniform. You sleep very little. Always in a new place, always at an odd hour. The green girl leaves food out for you in hopes of coaxing you out, but you don't take it. You don't have much of an appetite, and besides that, you honestly don't trust any kind of foodstuff here. You have decided to assume that it is poisoned or drugged until you see someone else try it first. You do not actually stick around long enough for that, though, anyway. You are much too busy avoiding being spotted. This is a new environment, and you don't know it well, so finding new hiding places is tricky work at times. Oddly enough, no one tries to stop you. They don't hunt you down or yell threats at you. The seadweller and her friend seem content to let you roam about as you please. You find this a bit disconcerting.

In particular, you find it especially disconcerting that the seadweller girl is, in fact, very normal at times. You'd always heard things. Your old owner had raved up and down about seadwellers being dangerous lunatics. Your lusus had always told you to stay the fuck away from the sea (not that you'd lived close enough for that to be a risk). But you don't see her going out flaying lowbloods every other day. Granted, you don't see her do much of anything. However, what you do see, you find peculiar. Every now and then she sits down on her couch with a book of some sort and just stares at it, flipping the pages every so often. You assume she's reading, but you can't be sure; you never learned how. She sits there for a while, you aren't sure how long, and just reads quietly for however long, until something catches her attention and she has to put her book away for something. You watch her every time she does this, curious in spite of yourself.

One day, she notices you.

You're easy to miss, sure, with your unremarkable horns and your small stature, but she spots you peeking around the corner, and both of you flinch. She averts her eyes, trying to pretend she didn't see you. You consider bolting as fast as you can in the opposite direction. Instead, you stand there, staring at her. She doesn't move to attack you. She doesn't ask you to do anything. She doesn't show any interest in acknowledging your presence. You stay that way a while; you staring, her reading, until your curiosity peaks again when she smiles at something on the page. You squint, as if looking harder at her will somehow divine the answers for you, and when it doesn't, you look around and cautiously-- _cautiously_ take a few shaky steps towards her. She remains unresponsive as you pause, considering your actions. You're rather out in the open at the moment; exposed. She could scream at you or grab you if she wanted. But she doesn't, so you get a bit closer, until you're carefully placed on her couch, leaning as close as you can without touching her.

She gives you an idle glance, but doesn't do anything further as you squint at the page, trying to make sense of the unfamiliar shapes and lines of it. You know there's a rhyme or reason to it; plenty of trolls have picked up the skill by your age, but the matter is you simply haven't been taught as of yet, and as such nothing makes sense. Instead, you get a bit closer, leaning against her lap faintly as if getting a better look at the letters will magically make them make sense. It doesn't, but you continue taking frustrated glances at the book until you are literally resting your head against her thigh, arms draped over the other side of her lap like an oversized meowbeast. You pout, then go still suddenly as you spot movement out of the corner of your eye. It's too late to run off-- not from this position, so you sit perfectly still, bracing yourself for a hit and wondering if you'll be able to yelp.

Instead, you feel fingertips threading through your hair and you discover that you can still purr; a skill you manage to take full advantage of as in spite of your instincts and judgement you practically melt all over the seagirl's lap. You stay like this a few minutes, her fingers in your hair and a smirk on her face and your secondary vocals buzzing up a storm, before she breaks that harmony with a question.

"Reelas, right?" she asks. You nod, and kind of wonder how she knows that. Then you remember that it's probably on your ownership papers, along with your casterank, symbolhight and psion level. You feel a little stupid again.

"Kellen," she says, continuing to play with your hair.

"The joke was that the Butler did it, by the wave," she adds, and you snicker mid-purr. You don't get it. You also don't care. You're oddly at ease for once, you're sleepy as hell, and you're riding a mild endorphin high from what she's doing with your head. The joke is less than relevant, and besides, she knows your name. The pretty girl-- Kellen, rather-- knows your name.

Your name is Reelas Kamaya and you think you might like your new home more than you expected.

**Author's Note:**

> Happy synthesizer look, things will get better  
> I'll play a inspirational melody  
> You don't have to pretend to be strong, okay?  
> Just be true to yourself  
> There's one small thing  
> That this useless me can do  
> A little shy but a simple mind  
> I'll deliver it to you through electronic sounds  
> -Happy Synthesizer


End file.
